Israel to World: "Suck It."

You're all so right - Anti-semitism is so 14th Century! They should
really just get over it!

While the Shoah does not justify more evil, I think it's incredibly
short-sighted to dismiss the issue of anti-semitism as a "card" - as
if it's some kind of underhanded trick even to mention it. And to
acknowledge it as a defining feature of Israeli policy does not mean
that one condones those policies - nor can it be used to somehow
outweigh Arab suffering. But how can you even discuss the issue
without addressing the religious conflict and history ?

Thats not what i am sayiing, you would have to be to a fool to fail to
recognize how much anti semistims infects the reaction to Israel esp.
among the arabs . Thats said the minute you call israel on any of
there noxius policices they say your an anti semite and the debate
shuts down.

How is it that the Hamas doesn't represent the Paelstinian people
except when Israel threatens to "roll over" them?

I haven't said that Hamas ever represents the Palestinian
people. I just thought you might have noticed that every Isreali
action in Palestine -- assassinations, town occupations, etc. --
winds up killing almost as many civilians as the average suicide
bomb. It's not as if they stride in, arrest these people, and leave:
they bulldoze through entire towns or rocket out entire
intersections. Last week's assassination took out a toddler.

What boggles my mind is not Palestinian discontent, but your
acceptance of it at the level of consitently and intentionally
killing innocent civilians.

And I've never said that I "accept" those actions -- only that I
grasp the motivation behind them. And yes, I'm not going to be quite
as morally upset at a people living under military occupation in an
apartheid system as I am at a recognized nation with a powerful
military. Would the Palestinians -- and everyone else on Earth --
have been better off if they'd framed their struggle peacefully, as
black South Africans more or less did? Undoubtedly. But isn't that
near-saintly behavior to expect?

As for being helpful and reasonable, where doessuck it fall into
that?

Here is where you're quite obviously not paying attention, because
you're agreeing with me! (And I'm not trying to be rude -- I just
don't understand the statement at all.) My whole point in starting
this thread is that Israel's big "suck it" to diplomacy is
neither helpful or reasonable, so I'm not sure what you're
getting at here.

Equating McVeigh with the Hamas is quite a stretch.

Again, I'm not "equating." Simply an example of how in no other
situation do we hold a political figure responsible for the actions
of every member of his constituency! (Doubly so with Arafat in that
he's not a proper "leader" of the Palestinian populace, and triply so
with Arafat in that most of the groups organizing such attacks are
entirely opposed to Arafat and the PLO.) If the man had a state, and
he were its leader, there'd be a little more grounds to criticize his
police work.

Having the Hamas continue to kill people with no culpability was
just unaceptable to the Israeli government.

I should think assassination without trial constitutes some
culpability, doesn't it? And I feel like you're thinking Hamas is a
tool of Arafat's, which simply isn't the case: the very reason Arafat
can't reign in groups like Hamas is that they are his
competitors!

I mean, Israel should talk about concessions while the Hamas is
blowing up buses?

See, I think you have to stop viewing the situation by looking at
terrorism first. Someone could just as easily say: Palestine should
talk about concessions while Israel is blowing up buildings?
Palestine should talk about concessions while Jewish-only settlements
continue to exist? It's as if you're pretending that the sole problem
to be solved is Palestinian terrorism, and everything Israel does is
just a response to that -- but both history and the present are a lot
trickier than that.

You've definitely got a point there - and that attitude has been
bolstered by the US's unquestioning support for far too long. The
history of enmity just makes me lose hope for there ever being peace
there.

Oh, and bnw -- I do admit that I have been focusing on one side of
the argument here. I also completely understand that it's precisely
what I've been saying about Arafat above -- the difficulty of
solidfying, regimenting, and properly representing Palestine -- that
explains Israel's qualms about taking their hands off of the region:
obviously they don't want to share borders with an unruly, unstable,
deeply divided state that's largely hostile toward them. I grasp that
even more than I grasp the motivations behind suicide bombing.

The thing is, I just can't morally justify the segregation and
oppression of an entire populace simply because portions of it are
violently hostile to you. It comes down one group depriving another
of liberty simply to guarantee its own -- Israel segregating,
restricting, and occupying the lands of Palestinians simply because
they (legitimately) don't think they can feel safe if Palestinians
have the rights of full citizens either in Israel or in a Palestinian
state*. And I'm sorry -- this is untenable, and only feeds on itself,
as the longer you deprive a group of liberty, the more hostile
they'll grow toward you. I think that is my central problem
here.

* And note that it was Israel who initially decided this with
their mass expulsion of Palestinians who were, by and large, living
peacefully within Israel proper -- and note that of all the attacks
on Israel carried out during the past few years, only two, IIRC, have
been conducted by Israeli Arabs. Both of these things hint
that the liberty-for-safety trade was not only a bad one but an
unnecessary, counter-productive one.

the Shoah/anti-semitism card literally makes me feel sick.
There's a long history to how the holocaust has been used:

Ah yes, those Jews have been using it for 50 whole
years! I mean, for a religon thats been around almost 6000
years, that's a whopping less than 1%. And by the way, when are
Americans going to shut up about Pearl Harbor? It's as if WW2
was central to their identity or something.

I just thought you might have noticed that every Isreali action
in Palestine -- assassinations, town occupations, etc. -- winds
up killing almost as many civilians as the average suicide
bomb.

I still think there's a difference between going
after militants then going after people sitting in a cafe. And if the
actions were reversed, Israel's government would be viewed as
monstrously cruel. My point about "suck it" was directed at your
interpretation of what Israel cutting off Arafat means. I'm saying
your choice of terminology reveals an obvious bias towards the
situation.

If the man had a state, and he were its leader,
there'd be a little more grounds to criticize his police work.

There indeed would be, but what Israel contends is that
Arafat was never doing all he could. Jailing militants overnight
then releasing them the next working wasn't cutting it. I honestly
don't know if cutting off Arafat will make the situation bloodier.
What will is Israel storming in to try and take Hamas out entirely
themselves. (See, I'm not attempting to entirely disagree with
you about the situtation, just certain points.)

See, I
think you have to stop viewing the situation by looking at
terrorism first.

I do think you're right here. There is
just no neat and clean cause and effect relationship, which is
what makes defusing this type of situation so difficult. I don't
believe the South African analogy is particular fair because it fails
to acknowledge how Israel has been forced to become a military
state due to constant attacks on its existence by neighboring
Arab states. This doesn't excuse poor treatment of the
Palestinians, but I think it is a large element in the Israeli
mindset of trying to provide safety first. I think where we also
disagree is in gauge of how much terrorism Israel is going to
have to suck up, in order to get the peace process back on track.
By suck up, I mean not retaliating. I think you put an
unreasonable expectation on them in that regard.

Okay, bnw -- we seem to be finding some common ground here. Here are
my only objections:

I still think there's a difference between going after militants
then going after people sitting in a cafe.

Sure, there's a difference. A huge one. But when "going after
militants" repeatedly results in the death or dislocation of
basically innocent bystanders -- as innocent as the folks in those
cafes -- it becomes a little harder to justify, morally speaking. And
I stick with my point, above, which is that it's really difficult to
start applying general consequences to the actions of individual, non-
representative groups, whereas it's a lot easier to do so for the
regimented military of a sovereign nation. I.e., you can't say that
one side attacks the other, or vice versa, because in the case of
Palestine there is no "other" -- just a mass of individuals
without a state, without a leader, etc.

My point about "suck it" was directed at your interpretation of
what Israel cutting off Arafat means. I'm saying your choice of
terminology reveals an obvious bias towards the situation.

In one sense yes, but in one sense, no: I was originally going to
use "fuck it," but decided to try and keep the boards a little
cleaner. Maybe I should have stuck with "fuck," because what's going
through Sharon or his coalition's heads can't really be that far from
throwing up their hands and saying, "Fuck it -- we give up on talking
to you." That's quite clearly the message, and I think it can
describes that way even if you believe Israel is entirely
justified in doing this.

[W]hat Israel contends is that Arafat was never doing all he
could.

Define "could." Seriously. Because this is what I'm getting at above.
It's undeniable that Arafat physically and politically could
have tried more. But my point is that he could have done so without
gradually abandoning his own clout and losing support to groups like
Hamas -- which would, in the long term, have been a lot worse of a
situation if peace were the end goal. He essentially had to walk a
very fine line between making progress with Israel and pissing off
militants in Palestine -- and sure, it's open to debate whether he
walked that line close enough, but I'm just saying we should keep in
mind that he was never really in a position to utterly subdue
the entire Palestinian populace.

I don't believe the South African analogy is particular fair
because it fails to acknowledge how Israel has been forced to become
a military state due to constant attacks on its existence by
neighboring Arab states.

I can't claim to be an expert on this history, but I think you'll
find that black Africans did their fair share of attacking in
colonial South Africa. Apartheid didn't stem simply from racism, but
partly from the same thinking that seems to be in operation in the
mid-East -- that a particular group of people pose a danger of
rebellion or violence and thus must be pre-emptively subdued. I mean,
look at your statement above: Israel becomes militaristic because of
attacks by neighboring Arab states. The only sense in which this
justifies their attitude toward Palestine is that Palestinians are
also Arabs, and are thus ideologically disposed to be hostile toward
Israel. From there it just becomes a matter of "We will segregate and
suppress Arabs as a whole," which, however logical it may be, doesn't
strike me as morally tenable. It's not just "militants" who are
having their lands seized or their roads blocked in the West Bank and
the Gaza Strip -- it's the vast majority of Arabs within greater
Israel, including many who were expelled from Israel proper
and are not allowed to return, based not on their activities but on
their potential activities. Would a better analogy be the US's
internment of Japanese during WWII?

I think it is a large element in the Israeli mindset of trying to
provide safety first. I think where we also disagree is in gauge of
how much terrorism Israel is going to have to suck up, in order to
get the peace process back on track.

"Safety first" may trump a lot of other concerns, but for me -- and
this may be personal -- it doesn't trump basic human rights. The
internment apparently struck people as a perfectly reasonable safety
measure at the time, but I hope we'd all agree that even if some of
those interned would have been more loyal to Japan than the
US, the greater cost wasn't worth it. As far as sucking up, well,
someone has to do some sucking up here, and thus far it's
Palestinians who are sucking up being tenth-class citizens of the
nation they ostensibly live in, plus progressive settlement. Put
another way: given the choice to be an Israeli citizen or
Palestinian, wouldn't you choose to be Israeli? And doesn't that hint
that the threat of death by terrorism is significantly less onerous
than the situation of the average Palestinian?

From the AP: Israeli Foreign Minister Shimon Peres, who negotiated
interim peace deals with Arafat, said he told Sharon that the
decision to shun the Palestinian Authority was short-sighted. "I
asked him, 'Suppose Arafat disappears, what will happen then?'" Peres
told the Yediot Ahronot daily in an interview published Friday. "If
we chase Arafat out of here, we will get into problems with the Arab
world, and Egypt and Jordan will sever ties with us."

The question, which is moral and not logistical: Israel undertakes
massive sweep in the West Bank, arresting several, killing several
Palestinian policemen in armed confrontation. What do we think,
morally, about a sovereign nation arresting and imposing its own
justice system on (leave alone assassinating) individuals who don't
likewise enjoy the full rights of citizenry in that nation? I stress
that this is not specific or logistical, but a general moral
question.

And I stick with my point, above,
which is that it's really difficult to start applying general
consequences to the actions of individual, non- representative
groups, whereas it's a lot easier to do so for the regimented
military of a sovereign nation

This is true and yet
doesn't it afford Palestinian aggression (equating that with the
Hamas) an easy way out of any culpability whatsoever? (I know
we've gone through that cul de sac already, but terrorism without
consequences burns my ass.) I think any sort of posturing with
Arafat and the PA was a better tactic than cutting him off directly.
Perhaps a little double dealing of their own would have been
wiser. Keep smiling and shaking hands with Arafat, while
simultaneously going in after the Hamas. Make Arafat be the
one to storm out (again).

He essentially had to walk
a very fine line between making progress with Israel and pissing
off militants in Palestine

If Arafat cannot offer any
concessions, as in the Camp David talks, without pissing off the
militants, then what does that say about the people of Palestine?
Are they behind the Hamas in wanting to wipe Israel off the
planet, or do they want to co-exist? What I'm saying is if these
limits placed on Arafat are so immovable; doesn't that say
something about the Palestinian willingness to discuss any sort
of peace process? Kinda makes them look to be saying "suck it"
all along. Also, I think Israel would contend that Arafat should be
pissing off militants. He should be imprisoning them or
assasinating them, as the PA does to those suspected of
working with the Israeli government.

Oh and to follow
Einstein's theory of political bickering: for every quote presented
there will be an equal and opposite quote presented: “We will
not arrest the sons of our people in order to appease Israel. Let
our people rest assured that this won't happen.”
— Chief of the P.A. Preventive Security in the West Bank, Jebril
Rajoub This I believe falls under what more Arafat
"could" have done.

Apartheid didn't stem simply from
racism, but partly from the same thinking that seems to be in
operation in the mid-East -- that a particular group of people
pose a danger of rebellion or violence and thus must be
pre-emptively subdued.

Pre-emptive? If I can't use
the cause and effect argument then neither should you. I could
just as easily state that Israel is there because of terrorism.
There also seems to be an overlooking of the Six Day
War.

It's not just "militants" who are having their
lands seized or their roads blocked in the West Bank and the
Gaza Strip -- it's the vast majority of Arabs within greater Israel,
including many who were expelled from Israel proper and are
not allowed to return, based not on their activities but on their
potential activities.

Funny, expelled is the
same term I've read to what happens to Jews in Arabic
countries. For what its worth, Arabs (or Muslims might be more
fitting) are citizens in Israel. They receive the same rights, and
can vote. Even the women. Would a better analogy be the
US's internment of Japanese during WWII? I think so. Or
perhaps American detainment of Arabic foreigners post 9/11.
"Safety first" may trump a lot of other concerns, but for me --
and this may be personal -- it doesn't trump basic human rights.
I think this where I differ from a lot of people on the left as I
found out after 9/11. I think the first priority of a government is to
protect its citizens. And I know this is more of a spectrum type
argument, as to where do you draw the line between protecting
and infringing on rights. As far as sucking up, well, someone
has to do some sucking up here, and thus far it's Palestinians
who are sucking up being tenth-class citizens of the nation they
ostensibly live in, plus progressive settlement.Way, way one
sided. Palestinians = victims. Israel = opressors. Come on,
you know it isn't that simple. I am curious how much of the
history of Palestine you're familar with. As a lot of liberal minded
folks seems to be unaware of what exactly has transpired
between Israel and its neighboring countries in the last 50 years.
Like why was there no Palestinian state before Israel proclaimed
its own statehood or before the 6 Day War?

Put
another way: given the choice to be an Israeli citizen or
Palestinian, wouldn't you choose to be Israeli? And doesn't that
hint that the threat of death by terrorism is significantly less
onerous than the situation of the average Palestinian?

Nah, more so because Israel has more of a
Western lean i.e. its a capitalist Democracy.

What
do we think, morally, about a sovereign nation arresting and
imposing its own justice system on (leave alone assassinating)
individuals who don't likewise enjoy the full rights of citizenry in
that nation?

Sounds like America going after the
al-Queda. Therefore, morally it depends on the reasoning
behind the imposition. Still, you make it seem as if Israel does
not want to recoginize Palestine as a state. (Perhaps we should
boil down our arguments, if possible. I don't like running in
circles. Thats more pointed at me than you.)

Well, running in circles is pretty much par for this course -- no
easy arguments on any side. I enjoy arguing it out, though,
insofar as it's not a situation where I believe in my stance with
absolute conviction, and talking = thinking / learning.
Clarifications and rebuttals, though:

If Arafat cannot offer any concessions, as in the Camp David
talks, without pissing off the militants, then what does that say
about the people of Palestine?

You're absolutely right -- it says a whole lot of them consider
Israel's very presence to be an affront (and I think there's a
reasonable case to be made in this regard), and it says that a whole
lot of them are stuck enough on this point that they're not
content to co-exist. Absolutely. The question is how this situation --
which isn't going to be changed simply by telling them they're
wrong -- would best be handled. Having normalized relations with a
figure like Arafat seems the best available way to steer
things in a less oppositional direction; Arafat has as much clout in
Palestine as any single figure could reasonably be expected to have,
he's somewhat beholden to appease the requests of the West, and his
line is soft enough that organizations like Hamas are outright
opposed to him. I think what I'm saying is that if you're dealing
with a populace that's largely hostile to you, the logical route to
changing this is to deal with the least hostile figure that populace
can deliver, right?

Also, I think Israel would contend that Arafat should be pissing
off militants.

This is where I think you're ignoring the point I tried to make
above. For Arafat to have pissed of militants would have meant
weakening of his support, and quite possibly his assassination. This
would leave us with practically nothing but the very militants
you're talking about, not even a weak check on those
militants -- plus they would be, as you say pissed off. Surely
this was part of Arafat's thinking -- that he could do more good
alive and in power than otherwise. You're saying that Arafat should
have served as a tool to certain ends, but what if too strenuous use
would only have broken the tool?

The quote you provide is yet another example of this: no Palestinian
figure could accumulate any support or maintain any power
without such posturing.

Pre-emptive? If I can't use the cause and effect argument then
neither should you. I could just as easily state that Israel is there
because of terrorism. There also seems to be an overlooking of the
Six Day War.

Here's where I'm really bothered, because you're using a sort of
Palestinian Queen Bee reasoning that's simply not applicable. A child
born in Palestine today is born into a situation where his home is
occupied and open to seizure, his movements are curtailed, etc. That
child did not fight in the Six Day War. Thus any treatment of that
child that is in any way different from that of an Israeli
child is essentially pre-emptive suppression -- pre-emptive in that
the suppression is contingent on the idea that this child may
be hostile toward Israel. I'm not saying it's pre-emptive in the
sense that "Israel started it" -- just that their military oversight
of the Palestinian populace is not based on every single
Palestinian having done something to warrant it. Hence the internment
analogy: it's not that they've individually done something,
just that the entire population is viewed as a threat and suppressed
accordingly.

For what its worth, Arabs (or Muslims might be more fitting) are
citizens in Israel. They receive the same rights, and can vote.

"They receive the same rights" is the most laughable thing I've ever
heard in my life. To name one thing: Jewish-Only Settlements.

I think the first priority of a government is to protect its
citizens.

C'mon -- certainly some moral boundary must be put on this.
Citizens of the US would theoretically be much safer if we just
killed everyone who was ever involved in a violent crime, but would
you find this morally defensible? We'd theoretically be safer if we
could just nuke the entire eastern hemisphere, but surely there's the
quibbling little concern of destroying half of the world's population
to think about.

I'm sorry, but at this point, it basically is. The only "oppression"
Palestinians have been able to visit on Israel is the fear of
possible terrorist attack, which is not so much "oppression" as just
plain "threat." In turn, even the most peace-loving Palestinian lives
under a similar threat of death-by-reprisal (see that toddler,
above), plus a systematic removal of rights, which is precisely
what "oppression" means.

Nah, more so because Israel has more of a Western lean i.e. its a
capitalist Democracy.

I'm not sure how you reconcile this with your contention, above, that
Palestinians are Israeli citizens who enjoy all the rights and
privileges of any other Israeli citizens. "They vote," you say ...
but here you say that Israelis enjoy democracy and Palestinians don't.

Still, you make it seem as if Israel does not want to recoginize
Palestine as a state.

Well, define "want." They don't want to -- something like 56%
of Israelis think it's either a good or a necessary or an unavoidable
idea, but it still remains a concession that's being made.
And, as I said above, I understand why. But it's the same as the
suicide bombers -- I understand the motivation, I just don't think
it's morally tenable.

Goddamn, you reply fast! I was going to try and mention some
common ground between us, and things I agreed on in your post
before my last one which I neglected to bring up. Like Israel
killing Palestinian civilians in its strikes. As well as mention
how Israel attacking Arafat and the Palestinian police makes
little sense to me. But now I must rest my poor brain to respond
properly.

Ah yes, those Jews have been using it for 50 whole years! I
mean, for a religon thats been around almost 6000 years, that's
a whopping less than 1%. And by the way, when are Americans
going to shut up about Pearl Harbor? It's as if WW2 was central
to their identity or something.

Um.. correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't this thread about the
modern state of Israel? (kinda post 1945?)

Secondly, i never asked anyone to shut up about the holocaust.
The link i posted above was for the discussion of a book called
the Holocaust and Collective Memory by Peter Novick (published
by Fourth Estate), in which he examines the history of the way the
Holocaust has been cited by Israel and american Jewish
organisations since 1945. it's interesting in the sense that it
shows there's always been a contemporary political agenda to
using the holocaust as a moral imperative - like you do - and that
until the 1960s, the holocaust was played down, and manifestly
NOT pushed as central to the "jewish character" / justification for
Israeli military action.

I should have said all this when i originally posted, but I
assumed people would follow the link I pasted in.

it also occurs to me that I should point out -asap- that I'm not
playing down the horrors of the holocaust for one minute.

And also that questioning the logic of it as a moral imperative
that justifies the military occupation of parts of the west bank is
really just building a straw man and setting it alight, in a
pointless and potentially offensive way.

What I'm saying applies more to the US industry of holocaust
rememberance that -sadly- all seems ultimately to say "never
again will we allow Jews to be massacred by Nazis in central
europe in 1945" without looking at the mechanics of genocide
elsewhere or the current problems of the middle east, but still
generating tacit emotional support for Israel to act however it
chooses. So sorry if what i said caused any offence.

Sorry, bnw -- I guess I stumbled back in here right after you posted.
You know, I don't think I disagree with you about the situation as
much as it might sound -- this just happens to be such a complex,
contentious issue that a slight difference in thinking (say, "safety
first" vs. "human rights first") can radically change the end
conclusions one comes to.

The interesting thing about the Holocaust is that even if we
do take it as central to the Jewish experience and character,
and not just posturing or an attempt at justification, it's a rather
unpretty argument, and a bit of another "suck it": the subtext is
that Jews have historically been so threatened that they now have no
qualms about steamrolling anyone who stands in their way. Certainly
that's not an admirable thing?

Also -- and I tried to make this point when we did the "State of
Israel: Classic or Dud" thread, I still don't understand how anyone
justifies the necessity of a sovereign state of Israel. Without
getting into the "what was worse than the Holocaust" argument, which
is totally irrelevant, we can find countless other diasporas who have
historically been massacred, enslaved, and scattered from
their "homelands" in a similar fashion, but it tends to be agreed
that we should strive to live pluralistically, not dislocate masses
of people simple to return people to ethnically homogenous or
ethnically restricted "homelands."

Out of curiousity, bnw, how do you feel about the violent seizure of
white-owner farms in Zimbabwe?

This is interesting and alarming. (Link stolen from
Ethel the Blog.) The key passage being:

Alex Fishman is the main commentator on security matters
for Israel's largest mass circulation paper, Yediot Achronot, a
publication with right-of-center politics. Fishman is known for his
excellent contacts in the military. On Sunday, Nov. 25, Fishman
issued a prediction based on the recent assassination on Nov.
23 by Israel's security services of the Hamas leader, Mahmud
Abu Hunud. It was featured in a box on the newspaper's front
page.

It began, "We again find ourselves preparing with dread for a
new mass terrorist attack within the Green Line (Israel's pre-'67
border)." Since Fishman was entirely accurate in this regard, we
should mark closely what he wrote next. "Whoever gave a green
light to this act of liquidation knew full well that he is thereby
shattering in one blow the gentleman's agreement between
Hamas and the Palestinian Authority; under that agreement,
Hamas was to avoid in the near future suicide bombings inside
the Green Line, of the kind perpetrated at the Dolphinarium
(discotheque in Tel-Aviv)."

Fishman stated flatly that such an agreement did exist, even if
neither the Palestinian Authority nor Hamas would admit it in
public. "It is a fact," he continued, "that, while the security
services did accumulate repeated warnings of planned Hamas
terrorist attacks within the Green Line, these did not materialize.
That cannot be attributed solely to the Shabak's impressive
success in intercepting the suicide bombers and their
controllers. Rather, the respective leaderships of the Palestinian
Authority and Hamas came to the understanding that it would be
better not to play into Israel's hands by mass attacks on its
population centers."

In other words, Arafat had managed to convince Hamas to curb
its suicide bombers. This understanding was shattered by the
assassination of Abu Hunud. "Whoever decided upon the
liquidation of Abu Hunud," Fishman continued, "knew in advance
that that would be the price. The subject was extensively
discussed both by Israel's military echelon and its political one,
before it was decided to carry out the liquidation. Now, the
security bodies assume that Hamas will embark on a concerted
effort to carry out suicide bombings, and preparations are made
accordingly."

Well, there we go: that, bnw, is essentially how I've been looking at
the situation throughout this thread. Arafat may not have been as
strong a check on terrorism as Israel wanted him to be, but he was
still a significant check, and circumventing him means there's no one
left to make even the most minimal overtures toward peace.

Hence the internment analogy: it's not that
they've individually done something, just that the entire
population is viewed as a threat and suppressed accordingly.

Roadblocks I understand. Demolishing houses, I
don't understand that logic at all.

"They receive the same rights" is the most laughable thing
I've ever heard in my life. To name one thing: Jewish-Only
Settlements.

Well, are we talking Arabs within Israel
or within the occupied territories? Jewish-only settlements - I
am amazed people will actually move into these places honestly.

In turn, even the most peace-loving Palestinian lives
under a similar threat of death-by-reprisal (see that toddler,
above), plus a systematic removal of rights, which is precisely
what "oppression" means.

I'd argue that
"death-by-reprisal" is not near to the degree of the terrorist
attacks. Gunning down a busload of civilians is not something
you see the Israeli army doing.

They don't want to --
something like 56% of Israelis think it's either a good or a
necessary or an unavoidable idea, but it still remains a
concession that's being made.

No doubt, its
become a more hawkish state under Sharon. Sure would be
nice to extract the word "yes" from Arafat's mouth about a year
ago when Barak was offering statehood, practically all the
settlements, and part of Jerusalem.

it's a rather unpretty argument, and a bit of another "suck it":
the subtext is that Jews have historically been so threatened that
they now have no qualms about steamrolling anyone who
stands in their way. Certainly that's not an admirable thing?

Jews = 0.3% of earth's population. Nobody is
getting steamrolled. You are talking Israel and Palestine, not
"anyone." I just wanted to clarify that.

Also -- and I
tried to make this point when we did the "State of Israel: Classic
or Dud" thread, I still don't understand how anyone justifies the
necessity of a sovereign state of Israel.

Obviously, it
is impossible not to mention the factor of the Holocaust in an
discussion about Israel's statehood. The thing that bothered me
about your argument in that thread is that you seemed to
lambast Israel for being a Jewish state, when clearly there are
many Arab nations that are Muslim enforced states. Obviously
one doesn't justify the other. But it seems to me that if one is
wrong, both are.

Out of curiousity, bnw, how do you
feel about the violent seizure of white-owner farms in
Zimbabwe?

Honestly, I know next to nothing about it
except that it sounded terrifying. A case of the "haves and the
have-nots"? I can't even begin to get my head around the tribal
violence in Africa.

Obviously, it is impossible not to mention the factor of the
Holocaust in an discussion about Israel's statehood. The thing that
bothered me about your argument in that thread is that you seemed to
lambast Israel for being a Jewish state, when clearly there are many
Arab nations that are Muslim enforced states.

HUGE difference: my complaint about Israel was that it was
created specifically as a homeland for people of a certain
ethnic heritage, as dictated by the completely deplorable,
imperialist, anti-pluralistic line of thinking that various sorts of
people should separate themselves into self-determining "homelands"
(even if this means massive dislocation and reduction of self-
determination for someone else). This is somewhat different from the
people of an existing land adopting Islamic law, which is
woefully theocratic but in the end not so different a concept from
our own religiously-inflected laws in the US. In those cases Muslims
already constitute the dominant portion of a region, whether
we like it or not. But to create a nation specifically so that
one group can be dominant within it? The subtext is that people have
some sort of right to be able to go to a country in which they are a
part of the ethnic majority (and that said country should be situated
wherever they ethnically "come from," regardless of whether someone
else has arrived there in the meantime). We have to reject
that logic. To not reject that logic is to doom the very
idea of pluralistic societies, and to call for exactly the
sort of violence we see in the area right now.

You might recall, in that thread, that I ragged on Liberia for the
same reason as Israel. I rejected the idea that Jews deserved as self-
determining Israeli homeland for the same reasons I rejected the idea
that Germans deserved a self-determining Aryan Fatherland, just like
I'd have rejected any suggestion that all of the black people in the
1870's US should have been shipped over to Liberia or given Alabama
and Mississippi as their own sovereign nation.

And I think I pointed out, in that thread, that some of this may have
to do with personal experience. I do not understand
nationalism, because I don't have any nation to be nationalistic
about: I'm a "foreigner" no matter where I go. And yet I completely
reject the idea that I "deserve" or have a right to anything else; we
should all be foreigners.

And while I'm not going to claim that this is what was going through
Arafat's head, all of this is why I understand rejecting Palestinian
statehood if it's not accompanied by a "right of return" for all of
those who were expelled from Israel.

"Out of curiousity, bnw, how do you feel about the violent seizure
of white-owner farms in Zimbabwe?"

Honestly, I know next to nothing about it except that it sounded
terrifying. A case of the "haves and the have-nots"? I can't even
begin to get my head around the tribal violence in Africa.

Not tribal violence -- I asked because it bears on our discussion,
insofar as you would sort of have to support land
redistribution in Zimbabwe in order to support the existence of
Israel. The rationale behind land redistribution is that, well, the
land is African land and belongs to Africans, and white ownership of
it is the result of violent colonial seizure; thus it's time to give
it back. I am rather sympathetic to this logic. I am not as
sympathetic to the rather less clear-cut logic of the creation of
Israel, where the link goes back a long time, and the creation
of a diaspora and the shifting population of the region were due to
more natural historical processes, and not a recent, easy-to-identify
colonization -- plus the very existence of a diaspora, of
millions who had left the region, for centuries upon
centuries, and then try to make claims upon it?

At root I am sympathetic to the idea that people need land to live on
(see Zimbabwe), but hugely unsympathetic to the idea that people need
a land. It's reductive, archaic, racist, stone-age thinking,
and I simply can't support it.

"Out of curiousity, bnw, how do you feel about the violent seizure of
white-owner farms in Zimbabwe?"

The current situation is hardly cut and dried. My ambivalence is
increased by the fact that impoverished black employees get detained,
tortured and beaten senseless for working on these farms. Often they
have no recourse but to work in such places in order to escape
poverty.

The general populace are more concerned with survival than politics.
In my experience, the overriding concern is with the increasingly
totalitarian regime under President Mugabe.

Inspired somewhat by President Bush, his most recent tactic is to
label any opposition party member a "terrorist" and have them dealt
with accordingly.

The situation in Zimbabwe is spiralling rapidly out of control, and
the forcible repatriation of white-owned farms is only one such
example.

my complaint about Israel was that it was created specifically
as a homeland for people of a certain ethnic heritage, as
dictated by the completely deplorable, imperialist, anti-pluralistic
line of thinking that various sorts of people should separate
themselves into self-determining "homelands" (even if this
means massive dislocation and reduction of self- determination
for someone else).

The base of your argument I
agree with but the world has simply never been a pluralistic
place. As with the case of Israel, the question becomes does
the threat against the Jewish population justify the creation of
Israel? I'd say yes; you'd say no, no degree of threat ever does.
The interesting thing to me is wondering what amount of
Western anti-Semitism played into creating a state of Israel?
How much of it was "we don't want these refugee Jews in our
country so let's give them Israel."

Not to play Captain Defend an Israel, but acc. to the very sparse on details article, the people were killed when they resisted the commandos. If supposedly there were no weapons on board, what exactly were they resisting with? (For all I know, they just resisted by punching the commandos, or sitting peacefully, but that seems kinda unlikely.)

"The boats are carrying items that Israel bars from reaching Gaza, like cement and other building materials." -- which is really fucked up that they aren't allowed in Gaza.

but also:

The military said in a statement: "Navy fighters took control of six ships that tried to violate the naval blockade (of the Gaza Strip) ... During the takeover, the soldiers encountered serious physical violence by the protesters, who attacked them with live fire."

IDF claims they used tools and knives and someone went for a soldier's gun. Protesters claim that they only passively resisted. In any case, 14 protesters were killed in international by the IDF after commandos stormed their flotilla carrying aid to Gaza. Draw your own conclusions.

Just to preempt, I think the whole Gaza situation is totally fucked up, and that there is a lot more Israel + Egypt could and should be doing for the people living there. Either/both governments should stepped forward to work with any humanitarian mission if they are that concerned about weapon/rocket smuggling. That neither did, and just told the mission that they can't deliver the aid, is super cold hearted and basically evil by way of Hannah Arendt thoughtlessness. That said, if you want to deliver aid to Gaza, and you already know it's likely that Israel will step in and stop you (at least an even shot, some shipments are allowed through, some are halted), don't carry weapons. That a) sets you up for a violent conflict and b) justifies what Israel was complaining about in the first place -- that you're bringing weapons into Gaza -- and totally undermines any humanitarian mission you might have. And if you're going to carry weapons (maybe you need them in case of pirates? idk), don't open fire on the freaking army. How could that possibly end well?

Channel 10, a private station in Israel, quoted the Israeli Trade Minister, Binyamin Ben-Eliezer, as saying between 14 and 16 people had been killed on one of the flotilla ships. He said on Israeli Army Radio that commandos boarded the ship by sliding down on ropes from a hovering helicopter, and were then struck by passengers with “batons and tools.”

I think you are missing the point of the flotilla. It's not simply a matter of delivering much-needed supplies to Gaza. The point is to violate the Israeli blockade. The point is to draw attention to Israel's policies.

I guess it's possible commandos killed innocents only passively resisting, and then the army covered up for a bunch of psychos in their army, but sounds very unlikely to me. Israel has a functioning press. I don't think that's the kind of thing the government could get away with. (But I could be wrong!)

If the purpose was to provoke Israel into murdering civilians, then mission accomplished, I guess. It seems like a lot of strategy is provoking Israel to do something horrific and then hoping something changes because of it. Maybe this'll be the catalyst for complete change in the relationship between Israel and Gaza -- or maybe it'll just be another really tragic, morally repulsive moment in the Middle East that does nothing to change the status quo or make life better for the people living in Gaza.

Super Cub, I know plenty about the Palestinian/Israeli conflict. Do you know how Israeli Press works? Most press in Israeli is very cynical and holds the government to account often. It seems unlikely to me that you could get away with lying about something like this.

Well, Ha'aretz is basically Israel's answer to The Guardian and is normally the go-to paper for a liberal viewpoint. But what they've done is to Xerox a government press release/statement without digging further, which may in itself be a comment on the behaviour of the military.

south african boycott movement had a lot of things going for it that BDS does not. for one, they were trying to end an apartheid system, not a military occupation. apartheid is inherently unjust. a military occupation is only unjust when it stops being necessary. as long as palestinians are stabbing jews and firing rockets from gaza they will not have the moral leverage that south africa did. nb i understand that south african resistance also included the use of terrorism but again - that was to end an unjust society, not to end an occupation - and even then it didn't take off until it had a leader with serious moral authority. maybe you're right and 20 years from now everyone will be boycotting israel. but i doubt it. i don't see it trending in that direction. if anything i think BDS is boiling off. if one day the pressure becomes too hot for israel, all they have to do is withdraw from the WB like they did in Gaza. unilaterally declare borders and keep whatever settlements they decide to. that's an option open at any time. you can't bully them into accepting all descendants of 48 + 67 refugees. it'll just never happen.

and meanwhile israeli society will become more mizrahi and more charedi and american liberal ashkenazi jews will become more and more defensive about it. but does anyone really believe that mizrahim gaf about what american jews think of them? i have yet to meet one who does.

there's a scale, it's not like every country in the world is militarily dominating its neighbors. there are plenty of countries that are small and relatively insignificant in the scope of world affairs and primarily concerned with minding their own business.

i think you'd be surprised. many countries you might think of as innocuous have all kinds of domestic + neighborly issues that just don't get 1% of the reporting that the israel/palestine conflict gets.

especially since its such a big deal on college campuses.. at least in california. there's tons of stories out there about students in the pro-palestinian/pro-israel camp really going at it. I havent seen polling but I think the youts are way less pro-israel than they used to be.

it's one of those things that is hard to gauge the actual size + impact bc both its proponents and its detractors have an interest in making it appear larger than it is. in terms of real world consequences though i'm not convinced it has had, or will begin to have a material impact on Israel. it may have an impact on American Jewish college students who feel battered and politically marginalized, which is definitely unfortunate but it's unclear how hurting American Jews will force Bibi to withdraw from the WB.

This week, with its fresh new $38 billion commitment in hand, the Israeli government announced the approval of an all new settlement in the West Bank, one that is particularly hostile to ostensible U.S. policy, the international consensus, and any prospects for an end to occupation. The new settlement, “one of a string of housing complexes that threaten to bisect the West Bank,” as the New York Times put it this morning, “is designed to house settlers from a nearby illegal outpost, Amona, which an Israeli court has ordered demolished.” This new settlement extends far into the West Bank: closer to Jordan, in fact, than to Israel.

In response to this announcement, the U.S. State Department yesterday issued an unusually harsh denunciation of Israel’s actions. “We strongly condemn the Israeli government’s recent decision to advance a plan that would create a significant new settlement deep in the West Bank,” it began. It suggested Netanyahu has been publicly lying, noting that the “approval contradicts previous public statements by the government of Israel that it had no intention of creating new settlements.” The State Department invoked the aid package the U.S. just lavished to describe it as “deeply troubling, in the wake of Israel and the U.S. concluding an unprecedented agreement on military assistance designed to further strengthen Israel’s security, that Israel would take a decision so contrary to its long-term security interest in a peaceful resolution of its conflict with the Palestinians.”

Much of that, while a bit more rhetorically clear than usual, is par for the course: The U.S. — in vintage Obama fashion — issues pretty, pleasing statements claiming to be upset at Israel’s settlements while taking continuous actions to protect and enable the very policies Obama pretends to oppose. But the State Department denunciation yesterday was actually notable for what amounts to its stark and explicit acknowledgement — long overdue — that Israel is clearly and irreversibly committed to ruling over the Palestinians in perpetuity, becoming the exact “apartheid” state about which (Ehud) Barak warned....

So Israel — in the words of its most loyal benefactor — is moving inexorably “towards cementing a one-state reality of perpetual occupation” that is anti-democratic: i.e., the equivalent of apartheid. And the leading protector and enabler of this apartheid regime is the U.S. — just as was true of the apartheid regime of the 1980s in South Africa....